


and it can't be undone

by thistidalwave



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-03
Updated: 2012-02-03
Packaged: 2017-10-30 13:16:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/332145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thistidalwave/pseuds/thistidalwave
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Castiel, Dean’s summer school tutor person thing, is having an existential crisis. Dean thinks he just needs to learn how to chill.</p>
            </blockquote>





	and it can't be undone

_remember the time when we stole the whole day?  
and nobody knows it, we took it away._

-

“I am having a moment of existential crisis,” Castiel says.

Dean looks up from the mechanics magazine hidden inside his history textbook. His tutor--student summer school support or whatever the technical term is--looks the same as he always does: reposed and stoic and wearing that stupid fucking over coat despite the fact that the sidewalks outside could fry eggs and the library doesn’t have air conditioning. He also looks, as ever, like he needs a good fuck to loosen him up--but Dean’s not thinking about that right now. No, he’s trying to remember what exactly _existential_ is supposed to mean in this context. Something about existing, he assumes.

“Uh, what?”

Castiel’s cheeks flush and he averts his eyes. Dean finds it absolutely fascinating. “Never mind. Are you finished reading pages--”

“Don’t pull that shit,” Dean interrupts. “Existential crisis, you say? I think you need to chill, man.”

“...chill?” Castiel asks, staring at Dean now.

“Yeah,” Dean confirms. “As in, blow this history shit off and go just... hang out. Catch a movie. Eat a burger. I could _really_ go for a burger.”

“You have to study, Dean,” Castiel says, concern colouring his voice. “You already failed this course once.”

Dean is already standing up. He has seen an opportunity and snatched it and he is not letting it slip through his fingers. “One day isn’t a big deal, Cas. I’ll see you back here tomorrow morning, bright and early. Go chill.”

He’s almost past the bookshelves and just thinking that he’s definitely home free when he hears Castiel’s voice calling him. 

“Dean, wait. Wait.” 

Dean sighs and turns around. “What?”

Castiel shifts his books from one arm to the other, eyes focused somewhere on the floor behind Dean. Dean thinks it’s way too cute. “I do not know how to... chill. If you leave, I will just go home and study by myself.”

Dean stares at him. He wonders how he ever got saddled with this guy--this beautiful and stupid guy--as his tutor person thing. God, he just wants to go home and have a nap until tomorrow.

“I was thinking you could, uh, show me,” Castiel says, his voice taking on a desperate edge when Dean doesn’t reply.

“Show you?” 

Castiel nods eagerly. He’s like a fucking puppy or some shit. Dean is a sucker for puppies. Fuck.

“Yeah, okay, dude.”

Castiel beams. 

-

The Impala’s front seat has never seemed so small, Dean thinks to himself. Castiel is sitting way too close for comfort--in the library they always sit across the table from each other. Now Dean can practically feel the heat radiating off Castiel’s stupid jacket. He thinks, for about the fiftieth time in five minutes, that this was a really stupid idea.

“Where are we going?” Castiel inquires.

“Uh, Harvelle’s,” Dean says, tapping his fingers against the steering wheel.

“That is a diner, right? I have never been there.”

Dean turns to stare at Castiel, whose eyes widen as he points at the road. Right. Driving. But _damn_ , he’s never met anyone who lives in this town and hasn’t been to Harvelle’s. Does Cas ever leave his fucking house? “Do you ever leave your fucking house?”

Castiel just looks confused when Dean glances at him. “Of course. I am not in my house right now.”

Dean chooses not to take that particular strain of conversation any further, lest his brain explode. “Well, let me tell you, you are in for the best meal of your life thus far.”

“Okay,” Castiel agrees.

-

Dean neglects his own burger in favour of watching Castiel take the first bite of his own. Cas’s reaction does not disappoint. His face is cautious at first, but as he bites into the burger, Dean watches first surprise, then thoughtfulness, and finally something that can only be described as _bliss_ cross his expression. It’s a bit like how Dean imagines watching a baby take its first steps must feel.

He grins across the table. “I know, right? Just wait until you have some of the pie.”

Castiel swallows and smiles back at Dean. Something catches in Dean’s chest, and he makes a mental note to put that smile on Castiel’s face as often as possible from this moment on.

-

They leave the diner a good hour later, stuffed full of deliciously perfect heart attack inducing food. Dean has learned that Castiel had been home schooled up until high school by his uber religious parents, as had his four older siblings, though Castiel had been the only one of them to choose to go to public school. Dean, over their second servings of pie, had imparted his own life story--his mother dying, saving his little brother from the house fire only to have to grow up with the little bitch, how hard his father tries. Somewhere in there he’d started talking about coming out to his dad, but that had made the light in Castiel’s face turn into storm clouds and Dean had promptly changed the subject. 

“So, what do you want to do now?” Dean asks when they’re sitting, once again, in the Impala.

Castiel seems to consider this question very carefully before saying, “I would like to go to the park.”

Dean is confused, but he starts the car anyway. “The park?”

Cas nods. “Yes.”

The drive over to the park is filled with silence. It makes Dean itch, like bugs are crawling just below his skin. He parks on the side of the park opposite the playground structures and grabs Castiel’s arm when he makes a move to open his door.

“You have to take your coat off,” Dean informs him.

Castiel stares at Dean. “Why?”

“Because, man, if I have to go stand in the beating sun and then look at you in that thing, I’m going to have a heat stroke.”

Castiel looks thoughtful--well, more thoughtful than usual--before nodding and shrugging off the jacket. He folds it neatly and puts it on the seat next to him. Dean tries not to stare, but, well, he’s staring. He can’t really help it. Castiel has very nice arms, and he’s apparently wearing a perfectly normal black T-shirt and holy shit okay Dean’s getting out of the car now.

“Why the park?” Dean asks once Cas has joined him, very consciously _not_ saying ‘you have nice arm muscles, can I touch them?’

Castiel motions for Dean to follow him over to the two benches that sit in the shadow of a few trees instead of answering. Dean’s beginning to think, after Castiel has sat on one of the benches and toed at the dirt for a few moments, that he’s not going to get answer at all, but Castiel surprises him.

“I live a few blocks that way,” he says, pointing. “I come here to think sometimes. To get away, you know. My family can be stifling.”

Dean has the feeling that Castiel has just shared something special and important with him. In acknowledgement of the serious nature of this event, Dean says, “So you _do_ leave your house.”

Castiel tilts his head, his eyes following Dean as he moves to sit at the edge of the bench next to Castiel’s. “I have never told anyone about this before,” he says gravely.

And yeah, Dean had figured, but it’s a whole different ball game to hear it out loud. He shifts awkwardly and clears his throat. “Uh, thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

They sit in silence for awhile. It’s actually nice, Dean thinks. The trees block out the full force of the sun, and the light summer wind rustles invitingly through the leaves. The air smells simultaneously like dirt and cleanliness, and Dean wishes, for a fleeting moment, that he’d sat next to Cas on the other bench so that he could touch him. Just brush their arms together or something.

“So, existential crisis, huh?” Dean says, breaking the silence. Castiel very nearly jumps, a minute movement that Dean might’ve missed if he’d blinked at the correct moment. He nods. “Did you want to talk about that?”

Castiel, as ever, takes a moment to consider the question. “Not right now,” he decides. “Perhaps later.”

Dean nods. “Okay.”

“You mentioned catching a movie earlier,” Castiel says. “Did you still want to do that?”

Dean frowns. “I don’t know. I guess there might be a late afternoon showing of something. What time is it?”

Castiel looks at his watch--because of course he wears a watch, the fucker--and informs Dean that it’s three-thirty.

“Do _you_ want to catch a movie?” Dean asks.

Castiel nods almost immediately, catching Dean by surprise. “You are showing me how to chill,” he says, as if that’s all the explanation required. Dean supposes that it is, really.

-

The only thing showing anytime soon is a romantic comedy that looks so stupid and cliched that Dean is positive he’s going to either fall the fuck asleep or get so angry he has to leave the theatre. 

They buy tickets to it anyway, because Castiel wants to see a movie and Dean doesn’t want to say no. He also buys an extra large popcorn with extra butter, because fuck if he isn’t going to need it.

They’re the only ones there, and twenty minutes into the movie Dean loses it and chucks a piece of popcorn at the screen. “You’re _stupid_!” he tells the screen. Castiel looks at Dean like he’s grown an extra head.

Ten minutes later, Castiel leans toward Dean (Dean’s eyes widen and his heart starts pounding a bit faster) and asks why, exactly, the female protagonist seems to have no other goal in life than fucking some hot guy. He actually says the word ‘fucking’ and Dean nearly has a heart attack.

Instead of collapsing to the floor, Dean hands Castiel a piece of popcorn. “Throw it,” he advises. “It’ll make you feel better about this shit.”

Castiel does, though he looks skeptical. He blinks, and it’s adorable, and he says, “That actually did make me feel better.”

“Told you,” Dean says through a mouthful of popcorn.

In the end, they leave just before the movie concludes, having thrown more of the popcorn than they ate. Castiel is laughing, though, and he’s smiling his perfect smile, and Dean thinks that he’s never seen a better movie in his life.

-

They’re sitting in the Impala again, and Dean is thinking that the front seat has never seemed so big. He had been enjoying sitting next to Cas in the movie theatre--he’d never put his coat back on, so their arms had been rubbing together in glorious skin on skin contact. Now there is an expanse of leather and air and the coat sitting on the seat separating them and Dean does not approve. 

“So,” he says, looking over at Cas, “where to now?”

Castiel doesn’t respond. He just looks at Dean, studies him as if looking into his soul, and Dean looks back and feels a bit like they’re maybe having a moment, and then there isn’t any space between them at all, because Castiel has moved and his lips are brushing against Dean’s and _holy shit_ they’re kissing. Dean feels like maybe his heart is going to expand right out of his chest and explode all over Cas.

“Whoa,” he breathes out when the kiss stops. Castiel’s face is still right in front of his--Castiel’s lips are _right there_ but not touching his, and that’s just wrong, so he kisses Cas again. It lasts longer this time, and somewhere in there Dean gets his hand tangled into Cas’s hair, and Castiel’s hand is feeling up his side, which, okay, cool, sure. Cas puts his hand on Dean’s chest and pulls away a bit, which, no, stop that.

“Existential crisis,” Castiel says, a bit breathless, and the words mean almost nothing to Dean.

“Huh?”

“I was having an existential crisis,” Castiel says, and he brushes his lips carefully against Dean’s again, “but I think that you’ve cleared it up for me.”

“Oh,” Dean says intelligently. “Can we do more of the kissing thing?”

Castiel smiles. “Yes. We can do more of the kissing thing.”

-

“I’ll see you tomorrow?” Castiel says expectantly. They’re parked in front of his house, and Dean is having trouble thinking about anything but how much he doesn’t want Castiel to leave the car. “Bright and early?” Cas prompts.

“Oh, yeah,” Dean says. “At the library. I’ll be there.”

“Good,” Cas says, and then leans over to give a Dean a lingering goodbye kiss, and seriously, when Dean got up this morning, this wasn’t what he was expecting from the day.

“Bye, Cas,” he says, and it feels more like saying hello.

“Goodbye, Dean.” He gets out of the car, books in one arm and coat slung over the other, and waves when Dean pulls away from the curb. Dean waves back.

Castiel is smiling when Dean glances in the rear view mirror.


End file.
